We can be HAPPY too

Childhood, the only ideal fantasy that ever was true, How long? How beautiful? It doesn't matter; childhood is always beautiful. Those carefree days when we lived part of life ever with so much enthusiasm, when we are allowed to be reckless and childish when immaturity was just a synonym to "cute" and when fantasies and dreams were respected equally with reality and above all the times that we all believed in ideality over reality. Sometimes I think growing up is a curse; our life and the rules to a good life change as we grow up, and maturity starts costing us our values, virtues, and in worst cases, dreams. We grow up to realize that the hope that "lived happily ever after "was false and unreal, or at least we stop trying to know if it is even possible. We become so busy living a better life that we forget to live life in a better way, and the worst is that we ever stop realizing the difference. Every time we lose the battle of time and change, we complain, complain that the dream was unreal and not practical, complain that we did not have the best of resources, and complain that we did not get enough help. We also complain that others are complaining about us. We bend the stories of ideality to prove our innocence and sincerity; instead of correcting our reality with the reference of ideal, we claim those as untrue and faulty." It's not practical," "We should think practically," "no one ever did that before, " become the famous lines to reject dreams, dreams of others, as well as our own. We are scared that we might fail, so we just reject it in the stage of "idea" itself. And so with time, ideality becomes a dream that scares us, and we end up calling all our ideologies, values, and virtues and dreams as fantasies and tag them "childish."

A few days back from today, I realized that the dissatisfaction that is deeply felt by each one of us is the result of this difference between the ideal life we like and want and the real-life we live and adjust to. Even after realizing this truth, we blame it on others; we blame it on society, on time, on destiny. On the system only to regret later in life, when we are closest to our ends, we regret not trying once more, not believing just once more, and we regret giving up.

It's shocking that we actually call our self mature during out mid-life; if you observe your self sometime we will realize that all those values, virtues, characteristics, and traits that we idealize and admire were always a part of us when we were still kids.and its really funny how we grow old to realize that our life would have been much better only if were more of what we were as kids then what we were as adults.

A few days back, I was discussing with my mother; I was trying to explain to her that given all her abilities and skills, given her interest and exposure in books and waiting, she should now start thinking about making a future in them. After listening to all that I said to encourage her . she only replied back, saying, "It's not possible anymore to dream so big."

It was sad to see her so disappointed in life. Still, one thing was evident to me after that day.our brain is a brilliant thing, more than we ever realized, and more than we can ever be. When we say it's not possible, it's not practical, it's not you who says it, it's your fear that makes you say it, you no longer want to risk or sacrifice a safe and cozy comfort zone for a journey of uncertainty and then your brain starts to cook up all those"Reasons" so when someone asks you "why " you can support your choice. However, more than anyone else in this world, the only person who clearly knows that there is no reason why we come up with reasons is sometimes the evidence that there is no reason actually. Only if we tried once more will we ever realize that if we do not have the guts to give ourselves a 101st chance after failing for100times already, then we have no right to claim reasons to explain why we never tried again.

My grandma always said that my mom was the most stubborn kid she ever came across; however, today, as I see her, I can only say that she is stubborn but for the wrong reasons. As a daughter, I will keep trying to make my mom realize that her "reasons" are too small and weak to make her give on her dreams and adjust to just being okay. Even though she has given up. I am still here to keep at it. Because I hope someday in time, if she has to ever think about her life, she should have no reasons to regret it.

Because I don't want her to hate her reality or complain about her present, I am a part of her reality. If her reality is only a forced reason, it means that even I am just a cooked up story to satisfy her fear. I can not bare to be a part of her painful reality. Suppose we dig deep enough into our reality, we will necessarily find ourselves adjusting without reality only because we have the guts to put our "safe " lives at stake for our "uncertain happiness".But we all deep down know that we are fine, we are safe, and we are okay as we are, but only if we try once more can we be HAPPY too. And if we can earn our happiness by being impractical or childish, I think it's worth it.

-Athena